1. Field of the Invention
The present invention relates to a system and method for advertising using an Internet browser with a book-like, flipping page-based interface. The present invention takes advantage of the book-like interface to create a better advertisement-viewing/reading experience for the user on the one hand and more effective delivery of advertisements for the advertiser on the other hand. At the same time, a novel advertisement matching and delivery model in connection with this interface becomes possible and suggests new methods for matching up the content providers and advertisers, as well as methods for revenue sharing between the involved parties.
2. Discussion of the Background
Currently, documents available on the Internet are usually represented in the format of “hypertext.” Each hypertext “page” can be arbitrarily long, and may or may not fit within one computer monitor screen. Pages of hypertext are linked by “hyperlinks”—on each page of a hypertext, there might be one or more “links” in the form of pictures or words which, when selected and clicked on (with, say, an input device such as a computer mouse) will cause the hypertext document to which the hyperlink is linked to appear on the monitor screen. In other words, the text of the new page replaces the earlier hypertext page. This is the mechanism by which, for example, the two most popular Internet browsers—Microsoft INTERNET EXPLORER® and Netscape COMMUNICATOR®—function.
In order to view a hypertext page that is longer and/or larger than one screen, one or more mechanisms is provided that scroll the page up and down (and/or left and right), or jump to a particular point in the page (through the use of, for example, a computer mouse coupled with scroll bars at the edges of the page displayed on the screen). In some embodiments, hyperlinks at one location in the hypertext page may point to another location of the same page and, when the hyperlink is clicked, the destination section is brought into view.
However, it is well known in human-computer interface research that these hypertext/hyperlink assemblages suffer from a number of problems. Chief among them is the navigation problem—the reader of a hypertext/hyperlink assemblage covering several pages often becomes lost during navigation of the hypertext pages. In other words, he/she often does not know where the displayed section of the hypertext/hyperlink assemblage is located relative to the entire content of the hypertext/hyperlink assemblage, what other content is present in the hypertext/hyperlink assemblage, where the other content is relative to the total content of the hypertext/hyperlink assemblage, and how to change the display from one section of the hypertext/hyperlink assemblage to another section of the assemblage.
Another disadvantage described by Internet surfers (people who read Internet documents) is that it is difficult to return to a particular hypertext page despite the fact that “forward” and “back” buttons are available on the Internet browser (such as Microsoft's INTERNET EXPLORER® or Netscape's COMMUNICATOR®). Since the hypertext pages are linked by a large number of links with no particular sequential or ordered multi-level organization, these two simple commands make transitioning from one page to another difficult when the reader hasn't followed a direct link between those pages. In other words, the “forward” and “back” buttons presume a sequential forward-backward organization in an assemblage that lacks such organization. Thus, the Internet surfers are often lost when trying to read a document with a complex organizational structure using only simple commands to proceed through the document.
On the other hand, sequential organization of information is found in the traditional book—pages are linked sequentially one after another. Though mechanisms for jumping across many pages are available, such as by selecting a page from the side of the book and flipping to the page, the information in the book is still laid out in an orderly, sequential manner. Also, a reader/browser can jump anywhere in the book at any time in any random order while maintaining a good understanding of where he/she is in the book because, in the process of flipping and jumping about, the location information is captured by the thickness of the book on both sides of a selected page, as well as during the flipping process. The flipping of the pages allows one to know the direction of movement through the document as well as how much one has moved through the document. The advantage of knowing where one is at any given time reduces the navigation problems if not eradicates them entirely.
Furthermore, one can also quickly and easily obtain an overview of all the information in the book by flipping through the book. On the other hand, a person is not only bound to become lost when browsing a 1000-page hypertext/hyperlink assemblage. Furthermore, such an individual will have difficulties obtaining an overview of the information content of such an assemblage.
Hence the major defects with hypertext—the navigation problems—are not present in the traditional book. One can browse a book of 1000 pages, and yet one can still comfortably know where one is, what else is in the book, and how to move from one point to another.
As a result, people browsing large amounts of information on the Internet often prefer to print the hypertext pages out on paper and then hold these sheets in their hands and browse through them much like the way they would browse through a book to look for and read information of interest.
The interaction between a reader/browser and printed material in a book is a subtle and complicated activity. To begin with, the material in a book is presented in a sequential order, with a continuity of material from page to page, and there is a hierarchical structure in the material presented (e.g., the material is organized into chapters, sections, subsections, etc.) because ideas in the material are related to each other in some kind of conceptual hierarchy. The human perceptual system inputs this data in a sequential manner, and after a book is read from the beginning to the end in a sequential fashion, the brain then recreates the conceptual hierarchy after viewing the material involved. However, very often one does not read a book (or input the material involved) from the beginning to the end because (a) one wants to have an overview of the material present; (b) one is searching for a particular item of interest; or (c) one is interested in reading only particular portions of the book (in the case of, e.g., reading the manual to understand how to operate something). In these cases, one browses through the subject book to find the material of unique interest.
Two basic things are achieved in the browsing process. First, the browser has a glimpse of what the contents of the book document are. Second, the browser has an idea of approximately where the items of interest are so that the browser can (a) return to look for them later when needed, and (b) understand the relationships between the material currently being viewed and other material (i.e., an understanding of the hierarchical structure involved). When browsing a book document, many finger-operations are required of the browser in order to flip through the pages. This mechanical act of flipping the pages, together with the inherent sequential order imposed by the pages, quickly allows the browser to have an understanding of the nature, location, and organization of the material in a book.
Similarly, the vast amount of information available on the Internet can benefit from the organizational structures normally found in a book, e.g., the sequential, page-by-page organization of information. These organizational structures give rise to two major benefits: 1. navigational problems are greatly reduced—e.g., they allow the browser to know where a particular portion of text is relative to the entire content of a document, what other information exists in that document, and how to move from one section of information to another in the case of browsing through hypertext pages, and 2. a good overview of the content of a document becomes easily available.
The sequential organization of information is not intended to replace the hyperlink mechanism available in a hypertext document. Instead, it is complementary to it. Other than having the pages linked in a sequential manner and accessible through a thickness display of the “book-like” representation, the hyperlink mechanism is retained and improves the browsing process. The advantage of the hyperlink is that the users can move quickly from one portion of the content to another related portion of the content. However, in the book-like, page-based sequential organization, when a hyperlink is selected and triggered, the process of going to the new portion of the content emulates the physical process. For example, flipping animation showing a number of pages moving across the screen proportional to the amount of information between the location of the hyperlink and the location pointed to by the hyperlink. This will aid users in knowing where the content they are reading and where the content that they will be reading is located within the hypertext/hyperlink assemblage and, combined with the traditional processes of hyperlinking, will aid the process of searching for information.
The hypertext linking mechanism is in some ways an electronic version of the traditional index usually found at the end of a book. When one is interested in a particular keyword or topic of interest, one may flip to the index at the end and, from there, move to another page that contains related keywords or topics. This two-step process—first moving to the index page then to the destination page—is achieved in one step with the hypertext linking mechanism. However, unlike physical paper books, the electronic hypertext linking process does not require physical flipping of pages to move to a new portion of the content. Instead, the electronic “goto” is effortless and instantaneous.
There are further differences between hypertext/hyperlink assemblages and traditional book (or magazine) representations of documents that are related to the placement and type of advertisements therein. In hypertext/hyperlink assemblages, advertisements that appear on the pages are rarely, if ever, sizable relative to the size of the page or the size of the viewable area on the computer screen. Therefore, advertisements most commonly appear as “banners” on the Web pages. However, in traditional paper books or magazines, advertisements often appear as full pages, and often as a succession of full pages. Even though advertisements on the pages of a traditional paper book or magazine still hinder and obstruct the reading and browsing process, especially in the case of full-page advertisements, this is somehow moderated by the book-like representation and tolerated by the users. This is in sharp contrast to advertisements in hypertext: full-page or multiple consecutive full-page advertisements on a hypertext Web page are anathema to many web readers.
The reason that full-page or multiple consecutive full-page advertisements are tolerable to readers of book-like representations is that the flipping page, book-like interface (such as in the cases of the traditional paper book and the interface of a special kind of flipping, book-like Internet browser described in co-pending patent application Ser. No. 09/617,043, filed Jun. 14, 2000, Ser. No. 08/992,793, filed Dec. 18, 1997, as well as a special kind of book-like human-computer interface described in U.S. Pat. No. 6,064,384) creates a 3-dimensional effect. Users feel that they can simply flip these “obstructing” pages away very easily (either using their hands directly on the pages in the case of the paper book or using an input controller such as a mouse in the case of the special Internet browser described in copending patent application Ser. No. 09/617,043, filed Jun. 14, 2000, or using a special flip-browsing controller described in U.S. Pat. No. 5,909,207)
Book-like representations thus provide a new method and system for electronic advertisement. In contrast with this new method and system, traditional advertisements on scrolling or hypertext/hyperlink assemblages are too restrictive from the point of view of the advertiser.
Advertisement is a necessary component of modern commerce. Conflicting issues are involved in advertising and include the facts that 1. the advertiser wants to deliver a message to the consumer, so the attention of the consumer has to be captured, and 2. the advertiser must not present the advertisement in a way or to the extent that it hinders the reading/viewing activity of the consumer or annoys the consumer.
The current advertisement method on the Internet is very restrictive. An advertiser can only display “banner” ads, as explained earlier. This is due to the kind of interface currently available on computers—the Windows interface which derives from the “desktop” metaphor which basically involves a presentation of a series of 2-dimensional “window” interfaces. On this kind of interface, the advertisers either have to contend with a small banner, which does not quite satisfy the need to deliver a message effectively to the consumers, or they have to enlarge the banner which hinders the activities of the consumer and annoys the consumer. Therefore, the parameters of the advertisement are very limited and not necessarily effective.
Another current method of advertisement on the Internet uses a pop-up window whenever the user enters a certain Web page to view data. This type of pop-up window is ineffective for both the consumer and the advertiser. From the point of view of the consumer, pop-up windows are annoying, especially when they are big. From the point of view of the advertiser, pop-up windows are ineffective because the pop-up window, unlike the usual banner advertisements on the Web pages, are not displayed long enough for the consumer to absorb the message. Many consumers simply close the pop-up window or move the desired Web contents into view and relegate the pop-up window to the background. Thus, the pop-up windows are commonly not viewed by the consumer for any period of time.
Moreover, another problem with current browsers and browsing methods relates to their limited ability to identify, contact, and recruit advertisers that will be inserting advertisements into the displayed content.
FIG. 14 is a table that illustrates various participants (along the abscissa) in the process of delivering various forms of content (along the axis) to a consumer, as well as their advertising practices. For example, in traditional books (first column), the book content is created by an author, “published” by a book publisher, and delivery of a “display” of this content (i.e., the book) is performed by a printer who manufacturers the books and a distributor who, in one form or another, brings the printed book to the consumer. In traditional book publishing, the advertisement process is limited to only a few participants and is furthermore unresponsive to changes in the marketing environment. For example, an author can insert advertisements into the content that advertise him/herself (such as the self-aggrandizing statements commonly found in the autobiographies of sports figures) or others (such as a commercial company that has paid the author to “place” a product within a particular manuscript). The book publisher commonly has almost no ability to advertise within the content, but rather chooses to place advertisements before and/or after the content. Furthermore, these advertisements only relate to the publisher and commonly amount to nothing more than a publisher's name on the book jacket or on the title page, and possibly a listing of other books available from the same publisher and/or author found before or after the content. Finally, the entities that deliver the content display to the consumer, namely the printer and book distributor (such as a bookstore), have almost no ability to insert advertisements regarding themselves and/or others into or before/after the content.
A similar situation is found in regard to the participants in the process of delivering newspaper/magazine content to consumers (FIG. 14, second column), except for the fact that magazine/newspaper publishers actively advertise for others both within and before/after the content. Once again, the entities that deliver the content display have almost no ability to insert advertisements.
In regard to the delivery of television/movies content to consumers (FIG. 14, third column), the entities that deliver the display have developed methods of inserting advertisements before the content. For example, movie theaters commonly insert advertisements for themselves and for local businesses prior to the showing of a film. Furthermore, the manufacturers of the display also insert advertisements prior to the start of a film. An example is the advertisements for “DOLBY SURROUND SOUND” commonly shown prior to commencement of the film. In these cases, the entities that deliver the content to the consumer have developed a limited ability to advertise before the delivery of the content.
Advertisement in Internet data transmission has not yet been developed even to the extent known in the delivery of movie/television content displays. As shown in the fourth column of FIG. 14, there are several entities that participate in delivery of the content to the consumer. A separate web host can maintain and/or update a memory containing the content under the direction of a web publisher. An Internet service provider can transmit the content data from the web host memory to a consumer's site. A browser producer can provide a browser that will decode and generate instructions for displaying the content data at the consumer's site. Finally, a monitor or other output device can display the content under the instructions of the browser.
The insertion of advertisements by each of these entities that deliver Internet content to the consumer is haphazard at best. For example, the web host is entirely unknown to an individual who is accessing content stored on the web host's computers. Internet service providers such as NETZERO place a banner advertisement across the top of the display screen. Thus, this banner is neither inserted into the actual content nor targeted to the content being accessed, and furthermore retains the aforementioned problems of banner advertisements. Monitor manufacturers only include a corporate logo located outside the content display area, and generate no direct advertising revenue thereby.
Advertisements recruited, selected, and displayed by a browser producer are likewise primitive. Both NETSCAPE NAVIGATOR and MICROSOFT INTERNET EXPLORER have limited advertisements to a title of the browser program and one or more corporate trademarks displayed at various locations on the browser window. This prohibits the browser producers from advertising for others than themselves, from inserting the advertisements within the displayed content, and from receiving revenue for the advertisement of various products made by others.
Therefore, the inventor has identified a need for a novel system and method for electronic advertisement that can be integrated into an Internet browser. Moreover, the inventor has identified an Internet browser with a book-like interface such as that described in copending patent application Ser. No. 09/617,043, filed Jun. 14, 2000 or a special kind of book-like human-computer interface described in U.S. Pat. No. 6,064,384 that takes full advantage of the interface for the most effective delivery of advertisements to the users. The inventor has furthermore recognized that advertisements inserted by the browser can lead to different revenue sharing models.